103 lines
2.6 KiB
Markdown
103 lines
2.6 KiB
Markdown
**Estimated reading time:** 11–13 minutes
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# Master Data Management
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## Definition
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**Master Data Management (MDM)** is the discipline of creating and maintaining consistent, authoritative representations of important business entities across systems.
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Common master-data domains include Customer, Product, Employee, Supplier, Location, and Content.
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## Simple Mental Model
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> **MDM answers: "What is the trusted identity of this thing across the company?"**
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## How It Works
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Example:
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```text
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CMS: Show ID = 784
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JW Player: Media ID = ABC91
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Advertising: Content ID = 55129
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Analytics: Content Key = 9031
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```
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These may all refer to the same program.
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MDM establishes mappings and an authoritative representation.
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## Example
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```text
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CMS
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"The Great Show - S1E1"
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Video Platform
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"great_show_ep01"
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Programming
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Program ID 81817
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Advertising
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Asset 500992
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```
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A governed master-content entity can map all of them to one canonical identity.
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## How It Fits Into the Bigger Picture
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MDM is related to [[Dimension Table]] and [[Data Governance]], but it is broader than analytics.
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Master Data can serve operational and analytical systems.
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## My Company / Real-World Context
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Content is a likely MDM challenge in a media organization because the same content may have identifiers in CMS, video, OTT, linear scheduling, advertising, and analytics systems.
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## CTO Perspective
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MDM initiatives can become enormous and expensive.
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Start with:
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> **Which business entity is causing enough inconsistency that centralized management would create meaningful value?**
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Do not start with purchasing an MDM platform.
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### Questions to Ask
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- Which entities exist in multiple systems?
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- Which system is authoritative for each attribute?
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- How are duplicates resolved?
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- How are identifiers mapped?
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- Who is the [[Data Owner]]?
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- Do we need full MDM tooling or a simpler governed approach?
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## Meeting Scenario
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**Situation:** Your team spends significant time manually mapping content IDs across systems.
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**Possible response:**
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> "We clearly have a master-data problem around content identity. Let's define which system owns each attribute and the canonical identity we need before deciding what technology is required."
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## Key Takeaways
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- MDM manages authoritative identities across systems.
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- It addresses inconsistency and duplication.
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- Master Data is broader than analytical [[Dimension Table|Dimension Tables]].
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- [[Data Governance]] determines ownership and authority.
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- Solve the entity problem before choosing the platform.
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## Related Concepts
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- [[Data Governance]]
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- [[Data Owner]]
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- [[Dimension Table]]
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- [[Natural Key]]
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- [[Surrogate Key]]
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- [[Metadata]]
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- [[Data Quality]]
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- [[Entity Resolution]]
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